The Nymphaeum, the Nymphaeum, the Nymphaeum is on Fire!!

Awesome coin and excellent write-up Z! Well done.

 

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Thanks, Phil! That was a great read... the stuff about the pyroeads is fascinating, and I didn't know about that unique bronze. Cool story about your wife and the necklace... I can't see clearly from the picture in the pdf file, but is that the second variety of this type catalogued by Maier, with the name ΔΑΜΟ-ΦΩΝ on the obverse? I think that one is even rarer than mine and the other examples we've been talking about. Incidentally, the featured hemidrachm in your article is the same coin that Doug was checking on that showed up twice in CNG sales. Did HJB sell it in 2012 too?

 

I borrowed images for the article. (They were credited somewhere in the magazine, but not in the body of the story.) The only coin HJB handled was the one in the necklace, and that never made it to the market. I posted a better pic of that coin in the next comment after the article, in case that wasn't clear.

 

Thank you very much for sharing your wonderful article!

 

Ah, I mistakenly thought the one you posted was the one sold by HJB. This one is indeed the CNG coin we were talking about. Did you manage to get pictures of the one you had set for your wife?

 

I do have pics of the coin in the pendant. That's what I meant to be posting all along. I'm just brain dead! Disregard all prior posts that don't make sense! Here's the correct coin, the one in the pendant:



and a better pic of the pendant:

 

That is completely custom and quite creative.

 

Thanks! Without too much false modesty, I designed it.

 

Very nice! That's indeed the one with the other magistrate name. My wife has little interest in jewelry and probably even less in my coins, so your wife will continue to be the only one wearing the Nymphaeum of Apollonia around her neck .

 

what a great coin Z, i wasn't familiar with the type at all.

check out this cool little naturally occuring gas fire in new york. it's around a intermittent stream and fairly small, the dark little "cave" it's in would be less than waist high.

 

Sorry to post so late.....but I LOVE that coin---it's beyond super-cool

 

Once again I have to blame/thank @zumbly (& @Volodya -- nice article, beautiful necklace!). Zumbly's excellent writeup lit a Nymphaeum-like fire in my head and finding one of these zoomed up to the top tier in my wish list despite its glorification of violence against bunnies .

As pointed out in prior posts, there are few comps so I expected a long wait. To my delight an example appeared in a recent auction! It's not in great shape-- par for the course for these, apparently-- but I love it and am very happy to be the new owner


ILLYRIA, Apollonia
c. 1st century BCE
AR 15 mm, 1.25 gm
Obv: AI-NEA; fires of the Nymphaeum of Apollonia; dotted border
Rev: AΠOΛΛΩ-NIATAN, lagobolon; dotted border
Ref: BMC 44; Maier 121

1/2 victoriatus? Diobol? Hemidrachm? I don't know so I'll just say AR 1.25 gm.

Edited:

Searching for other examples again I found my coin listed in a February 2014 Hirsch auction. It failed to sell and thankfully this time it was offered for considerably less. https://www.acsearch.info/search.html?id=1848847 I guess ratty off-center slivers of silver aren't everyone's cup of tea

 

Wow => cool score, Princess (congrats) ... neat coin-type

 

Nice! I just made a logical connect between the obverse and reverse types that may have thus far escaped numismatic scholarship of this issue...

1) Bash rabbit with stick
2) Walk over to Nymphaeum
3) Skin, skewer, and roast

 

The more I admire and stare at your new addition, the more that I'm convinced that it may represent an ancient golf driver and BBQ pit?





... I love it!!

 

You may be on to something! Perhaps golf has its origins in ancient Illyria, and bunny bashing evolved into golf ball striking? The firepit is the ancient 19th hole?

 

I don't golf, but I love the 19th hole.

 

I mentioned in some other threads that my Numismatik Naumann win from sale 44 (closed 7 August) had finally received Austrian antiquities authority export approval and been shipped... this is it. It's a drachm struck during the same time period as the OP coin, a hemidrachm (or 1/2 victoriatus). Fairly scarce in itself, it very much resembles earlier Illyrian drachms we commonly see with the cow and suckling calf obverse and stellate pattern reverse. The difference is in the inclusion of the distinctive motifs of the Nymphaeum fires and the symbol of the lagobolon within the linear border on the reverse.


ILLYRIA, Apollonia
AR Drachm. 3.0g, 17.8mm. Circa 120/00-80/70 BC. Aibatios and Chairenos, magistrates. Maier 120; SNG Cop 398. O: AIBATIOΣ, cow standing left, suckling calf standing right below; in exergue, grain ear. R: ΑΠΟΛ / XAIPHNOΣ, Fires of the Nymphaeum and lagobolon (rabbit-bashing stick) within double linear frame.

 

I'm not sure if it's a problem anyone else has, but some of the pictures of the first page don't seem to be loading up for me. Since one of the pictures affected is that of the OP coin, I thought I'd just post it again...


ILLYRIA, Apollonia
AR 1/2 Victoriatus (hemidrachm). 1.5g, 14.8mm. Circa mid-late 1st century BC. Maier 121; BMC 44. O: AI-NEA, Fires of the Nymphaeum of Apollonia. R: AΠOΛΛΩ-NIATAN, lagobolon.

 

Great new addition, Z-Bro ...

=> I'm totally jealous of the new fire-n-lagobolon winner!!



... is it just me, or is page-1 screwed-up (I can't see the coin-photos on page-1)